Donghaksa, Gyeryongsan

Quick facts

Address

462 Donghaksa 1-ro, Banpo-myeon, Gongju-si, Chungcheongnam-do

About this place

Donghaksa stands on Gyeryongsan in Banpo-myeon, Gongju. In 1457 Kim Si-seup, together with Jo Sang-chi, Yi Chuk and Jo Ryeo, raised an altar beside the Samundan and held a rite to summon the spirits of the six martyred ministers, then added an altar for King Danjong. The following year King Sejo came to Donghaksa, inspected the altars, and wrote out on silk the names of Danjong, Queen Jeongsun, Prince Anpyeong, Prince Geumseong, Kim Jong-seo, Hwangbo In and Jeong Bun, together with the six martyred ministers and more than two hundred and eighty people who had died wrongfully through Sejo’s seizure of the throne; he gave these names, had the summoning rite performed, and had a hall for it built. In the spring of 1864 Manhwa Boseon came from Geumgangsan, pulled down all the old buildings and raised forty kan of building and two kan of the summoning hall; in 1904 that hall was renamed Sungmojeon. Among the buildings standing today, the Donghak seminary is counted with the seminary at Unmunsa as one of Korea’s foremost seminaries for nuns.

Origin and history

In 1457 Kim Si-seup, together with Jo Sang-chi, Yi Chuk and Jo Ryeo, raised an altar beside the Samundan and held a rite to summon the spirits of the six martyred ministers, then added an altar for King Danjong.

The following year King Sejo came to Donghaksa and inspected the altars. He wrote out on silk the names of Danjong, Queen Jeongsun, Prince Anpyeong, Prince Geumseong, Kim Jong-seo, Hwangbo In and Jeong Bun, together with the six martyred ministers and more than two hundred and eighty people who had died wrongfully through his seizure of the throne; he gave these names, had the summoning rite performed, and had a hall built for it.

In the spring of 1864 Manhwa Boseon came from Geumgangsan, pulled down all the old buildings and raised forty kan of building and two kan of the summoning hall. In 1904 the summoning hall was renamed Sungmojeon.

Among the buildings standing today, the Donghak seminary is counted with the seminary at Unmunsa as one of Korea’s foremost seminaries for nuns.

What it is locally associated with

• Origin

  The rite of 1457

  Kim Si-seup with Jo Sang-chi, Yi Chuk and Jo Ryeo raised an altar beside the Samundan for the six martyred ministers, then added an altar for King Danjong.

  documented history

• Origin

  More than 280 names on silk

  The following year Sejo inspected the altars and gave over, written on silk, the names of Danjong, the six ministers and more than 280 who had died wrongfully through his seizure of the throne.

  documented history

• What people do here

  A foremost seminary for nuns

  The Donghak seminary is counted with the seminary at Unmunsa as one of Korea’s foremost seminaries for nuns.

  documented history

Names are written down twice in this temple’s record. Once in 1457, when Kim Si-seup and three others raised an altar, called the six martyred ministers, and added an altar for Danjong. Once the year after, when Sejo came, inspected the altars, and gave over more than two hundred and eighty names written on silk so that the rite could be performed. The record describes those two hundred and eighty as people who died wrongfully through his seizure of the throne.

Kim Si-seup, who raised the altar, appears once more on this site. He spent his last years at Muryangsa in Buyeo and died there, and the monks built a portrait hall and enshrined his likeness. The man who called the dead here in 1457 closed his eyes there in 1493; two Chungcheong pages hold the two ends of one life.

The hall’s name changed once as well. The summoning hall became Sungmojeon in 1904 — a name meaning the place of calling replaced by one meaning the place of reverent longing.

What the temple does now includes teaching. The Donghak seminary is counted with the seminary at Unmunsa as one of Korea’s foremost seminaries for nuns.

Related guides

• How to visit a Korean templeHands together and hands folded, how the bows work, and what to do at the threshold of a hall. Starting with what is different from visiting a Japanese shrine.
• The small hall behind the main one — sansingak and samseonggakUphill from the main hall of a Korean temple stands a smaller one, and inside it an old man with a tiger. This is where the indigenous religion sits, inside the Buddhist institution.
• Templestay — a night at a templeA programme that puts you inside a temple’s own timetable for a day or two. What you do, which type to book, and what to be ready for.
• Prayer sites and the one wishThe three great Gwaneum sites, the five relic halls, and the crowds before the entrance exam. Where the saying about one wish comes from, and where the record stops.

Sources

1. 계룡산 동학사(鷄龍山 東鶴寺) — 한국민족문화대백과사전 (accessed 2026-08-16)